In the early summer of 2024 I find myself almost completely incapable of penning my usual drivel about my favorite motorsport on Earth. I have bought a house and need to sell a house and am trying to cope with 50 years of accumulated memories and cargo. Not having moved for 40 of those years has been a blessing, but the chickens are coming home to roost these days. The players at this stage of the drama include two banks, the movers, an estate auction company, a ten-yard dumpster and a sizeable cleaning crew. On deck: a real estate agent and the drama surrounding the disposal of the childhood home of my three girls. My late wife is in heaven second-guessing my every move and cluck-clucking at my decisions regarding what gets moved, sold or thrown away. This process has become a vivid reminder that one should borrow books from the library rather than purchasing them; they have become their own problem. How does one throw away a book, for God’s sake?
Attendant issues, more of an annoyance than anything, include replacing appliances, arranging new internet service (OMG Comcast!), utility service at both homes, change of address notifications X 100, dealing with the BMV.
Piled on top of this are some troubling health issues, the aftermath of a stroke a month ago and some fairly clear signs that the cancer which was removed from my body in 2022, along with my pancreas, has found its way back. I will get confirmation of this in a week, almost assuredly without any kind of useful prognosis. The decision whether to replace the floors in the new house has more to do with the likely amortization schedule than the aesthetics.
In France last weekend it was, once again, the Jorge Martin show. New all-time track record, pole, Sprint win, Sunday win. Marc Marquez acquitted himself quite well in both races, starting from P13 and finishing in P2. Pecco had a disappointing weekend, retiring with a mechanical on Saturday and getting stood up by Marquez very late on Sunday, giving up P2 in the process. If I were Gigi Dall’Igna I would put Martin and Bagnaia on the factory team next year and Marquez and Bastianini on the Pramac team with factory bikes and damn the extra expense of four GP25s. If one of them has to step down it is likely to be EBas, which would not really be fair but c’est la guerre.
I really don’t have much to say about any of the other riders, teams or manufacturers. The exception is Pedro, who is rapidly coming into his own. But whether we like it or not, it must be said that the KTM is still not on the same level as the Ducs except at the Red Bull Ring in Spielberg which is where, I would be happy to wager, young Acosta will get his first win. And I think the writing is on the wall for Aleix and, perhaps, Zarco as well.
My fantasy team is doing quite well. I’m planning to use my next boost in Germany. And for those of you–I’m talking to you, Kevin–anxious for some tranches, I’m still working things out.
Spending less time with MotoGP these days and more time schvitzing about my health. When one is staring down the barrel of a potentially life-threatening diagnosis, one’s attention starts to wander at the prospect of sussing out all these diminutive Spaniards and Italians and Joe Roberts.
Thanks to daylight savings time–or perhaps in spite of it–I missed the Moto3 tilt entirely. As the winning margin was 4/100ths of a second I expect it was a good one, and I’m pleased to see David Munoz getting back in shape.
I’ve been wondering what it is that Ducati Corse sees in Fermin Aldeguer. Yesterday’s Moto2 confab gave some clues, although it was not a dominating performance in my opinion. The cool thing about Moto2 at this point is that Joe Roberts leads the series, presaging the possibility of seeing an American rider in the premier class for the first time since the days of Nicky Hayden and Ben Spies. With Trackhouse Racing now running Aprilias in MotoGP it seems logical to expect Joe to graduate next year. And ain’t nobody care if Raul Fernandez loses his seat after this season. Underachieving is his middle name.
I don’t have much to say about the big bikes this weekend. Jorge Martin won another Saturday Sprint but once again was the victim of an unforced error on Sunday, crashing out of the lead in a race that was his to win. The late race drama was provided courtesy of Pecco Bagnaia and Marc Marquez in a preview of what we can expect to see for the rest of the season. Unlike so many of you, I’m not a Marquez hater, and it’s nice to see him not having to override to be in contention. I have trouble getting all excited about Pecco; sure, he’s highly skilled, but he has the best bike on the grid, the best team behind him, and an enthralled nation gasping over his every move. I fully expected Marquez to beat him yesterday, waiting for Pecco to get twitchy under the assault of a guy who routinely ignores life-threatening situations. There was a day not that long ago when a rider seeing “Marquez +.2” on his pit board would generally go into convulsions. Yesterday in Jerez, there was a single bump, after which Pecco put the hammer down and Marquez minded his manners.
A few more races like we had on Sunday and it’s a fair assumption that Marquez and Bagnaia will be teammates next year, complete with the Lorenzo/Rossi wall down the middle of the garage. Marquez has a total of four races under his belt on the Duc after 11 seasons on Hondas and has pretty much fully adapted to the new world order. Even with the permanent disability in his right arm and being in his 30’s he’s better than all but one or two riders on the grid. When he was going after Bagnaia yesterday the locals in the stands went completely mental, which is always fun to watch and listen to. With three or four or five riders clearly in contention the sport is not as dull as it was when #93 was winning everything in sight. I will maintain that Marquez is good for the sport and look forward to seeing him on the top step in the foreseeable future.
After enjoying an exciting Tissot Sprint on Saturday, I was looking forward to watching another MotoGP Sunday at The Pretentiously Named Circuit of the Americas, deep in the heart. My plans were derailed late Saturday night when I found myself on the bathroom floor of my house having what turned out to be a minor stroke. My right hand was giving me sass, and I was unable to get on my feet. My phone, which normally offers me a six-digit code I use to unlock it, gave the appearance of having only five blanks, which was largely immaterial as I could not type nor slide the bar necessary to unlock it. My facial recognition screen was not recognizing me, possibly because I was covered in, well, puke. After a half hour struggle I made it back to my bed and resolved to wait until something happened to improve my status. My daughter and her husband showed up on Sunday morning, freaked the hell out, called 9-1-1, and off I went via ambulance for a four-day excursion through the medical/industrial complex at Indiana University Hospital.
The good news was that I became stable during the day on Sunday. I regained 95% of the use of my hand by Tuesday, my legs started working again, and I was largely comfortable, other than the fiendish hospital bed and the unfathomable sheets and blankets they provided. The bad news was that during the interminable rounds of tests they gave me to assess my condition they discovered that I probably have atrial fibrillation and that there is a better than even chance that my cancer is busily recurring, having left my pancreas and taken up residence in my liver.
Other than that, Mrs. Lincoln, how was the play?
Contrary to my usual practice, I am not going to spoil the race for those of you who have not seen it. For once, it was as good as Matt and Louis made it out to be. The subhead of this piece refers to the number of actual title contenders currently employed in the premier class. Four Ducati pilots–Pecco Bagnaia, Enea Bastianini, Jorge Martin and, yes, Marc Marquez, who crashed out of the lead for his second consecutive DNF but is showing definite signs of professional life in 2024. Aprilia veteran Maverick Vinales, who became one of only five riders ever to win premier class races with three different manufacturers. And, surprising few people even casually familiar with this sport, rookie Pedro Acosta on the KTM-GasGas machine.
As I am not 100%, I’m going to stop here and promise to better starting with Jerez. Those of you who have been reading this drivel for years will kindly dispense with the sincere best wishes and instead keep your affectionate slings and arrows coming, as usual. I expect to be writing this stuff for a good long while yet, and have no time for maudlin.
Here we go again. Swarthy miniature European jockeys holding on for dear life to grossly overpowered motorcycles. 20-some rounds all over the world between March and November. Six rounds in seven weeks to end the season, testing the mettle of riders and crews. Teenagers running wild in the lightweight Moto3 class; grizzled veterans seeking the top prize in motoracing in the premier MotoGP class. Half-length Saturday Sprint races on the big bikes making Saturdays on race weekends as exciting as the main event on Sundays.
Saturday
Jorge Martin is pretty much untouchable at short distances like qualifying and Sprints. It came as a surprise to no one that he took pole, breaking the all-time track record in the process, ho hum, then came back in the evening to win the first Sprint of the year. Brad “Skeletor” Binder dogged Martin over all 11 laps for another P2 finish, followed by the relatively ancient Aleix Espargaro. Bagnaia loitered his way into P4 ahead of a resurgent Marc Marquez onboard his shiny secondhand Gresini Ducati.
MotoGP is a great way to hear the Spanish and Italian national anthems.
Sunday
In Moto3, two of the pre-race favorites, Jose Rueda and Ivan Ortola, clattered out of the race on Lap 3. Young Japanese pilot Taiyo Furasato, coming from P18, put himself in contention for a podium in short order. Late in the day, Colombian David Alonso, Spaniard David Holgado and Furasato were clustered at the front of the pack, Holgado having led roughly 95% of the race. A classic Turn 16 overpass handed the win to Alonso. 25 bikes started the race, which seems to me to be half a dozen fewer than in most years.
In Moto2, pre-race favorites Fermin Aldeguer, Tony Arbolino and Aron Canet had terrible days, suggesting that the new Pirelli medium rear leaves a lot to be desired. Belgian Barry Baltus spent the last half of the race dogging eventual winner Alonso Lopez without a single cigar to show for his efforts. Sergio Garcia claimed the last step on the podium, followed by Ai Ogura and Manny Gonzalez. 2024 appears to be the year that the chokehold enjoyed by Kalex for the last thousand years has been broken.
In the premier class, Pecco showed that he learned a lesson on Saturday. He charged to the front from P5 on Lap 1 and stayed there all day, holding off Skeletor, who, in turn, stiff-armed Martin. Marquez finished in P4 ahead of the late-charging Bastianini. Teenage alien Pedro Acosta made a bid for the podium in the first half of the race and spent the second half of the race watching his tires turn to oatmeal, ending the day in P9. Dude will win some races this year and for the next decade.
Matt and Louis spent some time today pointing out how much faster the 2024 contests were than last year. I’m not sure where to go with this, but the elapsed time for the 2023 Qatar Grand Prix was 41.43.654. This year, it was 39.34.869, a full two minutes faster. They had been expressing shock over the fact that the Sprint was 11 seconds faster this year than last. Wonder what they will have to say in two weeks at Portimao about a two-minute drop in the grand prix. Every year I get readers commenting about how The Powers That Be are dumbing down the sport in their efforts to make fielding teams more affordable. If this is so, they are failing miserably. MotoGP, it seems, has never been faster nor safer than it is today. Of course, today’s race was shortened by a lap due to Raul Fernandez’ cluster immediately before the start. Thanks to loyal reader Mad4TheCrest for pointing this out.
2024 is going to be the bomb diggity.
2024 promises to be another long year for Joan Mir.
Jorge Martin has that look of inevitability about him
After difficult weekends in Indonesia and Australia, Prima Pramac pilot extraordinaire Jorge Martin held off stiff challenges from KTM’s Skeletor Brad Binder and world champion Pecco Bagnaia to win the Thai Grand Prix in the fourth-closest podium scrap in history.
His Thai weekend followed an increasingly familiar pattern:
Win pole by setting an all-time track record
Win the Saturday Sprint
Win Sunday’s main event
Martin now trails championship leader Bagnaia by a mere 13 points with three races left. It is a two-man race; Marco Bezzecchi is still in it, mathematically, but in no other way. Binder, whose track limit violation on the last lap dropped him from P2 to P3, has a bright future, but his present is reduced to trying to win races rather than a title. Everyone else has now fallen by the wayside. And although hope springs eternal in these parts, the grid’s view of 2024 is jaundiced by the prospect of having to deal with Marc Marquez on a Ducati commencing next spring. There may be more industry people watching the post-Valencia test on that late November Tuesday than the race on Sunday.
Those of you who follow me and/or Motorcycle.com, where I toiled as a freelancer for a dozen years, are aware of the passing of Evans Brasfield at the hands of a hit-and-run automobile driver, who was my editor and cheerleader for the past few years. I doubt I will get asked to work for my Canuck friends in the future. As such, I have decided that now is the time to change hats, from journalist to fan. I have some increasingly wonderful distractions occurring in my personal life and have found it difficult to devote the time and mental energy necessary to make these reports worth your while. I have also been saddled with very lame commenting software, both on my blog and on the Motorcycle.com site.
I realize that a number of you are determined Luddites who break out in hives at the mention of social media sites like Facebook. FB is not for everyone. But for my purposes, it is ideal going forward. It is dirt simple to post words and pictures, is amenable to brief observations rather than long essays, and has a robust commenting platform. It allows for discussion between readers, something I truly have missed since my days as a regular on MO ended. I hope most of you will at least visit my Late-Braking MotoGP (https://www.facebook.com/motogpfordummies) page on FB before consigning me to the proverbial dustbin of history. Kevin, I’m speaking directly at you.
One week off before the season-ending triple header in Sepang, Qatar and Valencia. Otherwise, I will close this week’s column by pointing out that I used the second of my three boosts on Fantasy MotoGP on Martin this week, which kept me in the hunt for the league title this year. A few of you will be disappointed to read that I’m stepping back from the greatest show on wheels. Rest assured that we can still exchange ideas and barbs going forward during what remains of this season, and during The Second Coming starting next year. Peace.
By now, I assume everyone reading this has either seen the race or read about the results. Jorge Martin took over the lead in the 2023 title chase for roughly 24 hours, winning yet another Saturday Sprint before an unlikely/uncharacteristic/unforced error while leading comfortably on Lap 13 forced him out of the grand prix. Pecco Bagnaia overcame a P13 start to win the main event on Sunday after a two point Saturday.
KTM tough guy Brad Binder knocked polesitter Luca Marini out of Sunday’s race, did the same to Miguel Oliveira some nine laps later, served two long lap penalties and still managed a P6 finish.
Alex Marquez sat out nursing his four broken ribs while Alex Rins raced with two barely-knitted leg bones and saw the checkered flag.
Maverick Vinales led much of the main event until his soft rear tire turned to queso midway through the race before finishing in P4.
Marini and Bezzecchi, with, as Louis Suddeby pointed out, “two fully functional collarbones between them” both finished on the podium on Saturday. Both looked good for a while on Sunday; Marini got clattered by Binder on Lap 4, and Bezzecchi flirted with the podium for most of the day until he tired at the end, finishing in P5.
Bagnaia’s win marked the first time in 17 years a rider starting lower than P12 won a grand prix. Um, that would have been Marco Melandri at Phillip Island in 2006.
Due to the painful attrition in the main event, Franco Morbidelli scored two championship points despite finishing four (4) laps down. And this guy earned a Ducati ride for next year?
Assuming the championship is decided again this year before the Valencia round in November, the most interesting part of the visit to eastern Spain will be watching Marc Marquez getting acquainted with the Ducati Desmosedici during the post-race test.
The new tire pressure regulations have now placed five riders on a bubble. Maverick Vinales ran afoul of the regs in Barcelona. On Sunday, four more riders–Bezzecchi, Aleix, Morbidelli and Raul Fernandez–recorded their first violations of this senseless rule. Meaning all five are at risk of a three-second penalty on the next occurrence. For Bezz and Aleix, this could have some meaning. But MotoGP needs to make up its mind. Enforcing such a rule while allowing ride height devices and advanced aero wings pretty much guarantees riders will get penalized at some point during the season, perhaps more than once, with the penance rapidly becoming draconian. If there’s one thing this sport doesn’t need it is to have a world championship decided based upon a technical post-race penalty.
The silly season is now down to determining who will take Marquez’ empty seat with Repsol Honda. Assuming either Oliveira or FDG draws the short straw, there could be a subsequent minor hassle with the RNF Aprilia squad. It doesn’t sound like HRC is inclined to boot Zarco up from LCR, for whatever reason other than ageism.
In Moto3 my boy Jaume Masia maintained his series lead in Indonesia, while Pedro Acosta, the next great Spanish rider, won again, confirming his coronation to replace Pol Espargaro on the GasGas team in the premier class is well-considered. Espargaro’s crash in Portugal during the season opener looked bad. It may turn out to have been career-ending, which is a shame. Let us not forget that this is an insanely dangerous sport.
From my limited perspective–the kitchen table at my home in Indiana–it was an enjoyable last weekend in September/first weekend in October as MotoGP arrived in The Land of the Rising Sun. Something for every taste and budget, as it were. In the premier class, young Jorge Martin continued his assault on the 2023 title, elbowing his way to pole, another Sprint win, and being declared the winner of the red-flagged main event on Sunday. Somkiat Chantra led an Idimetsu Honda Team Asia 1-2 in an increasingly familiar Moto2 parade. My boy Jaume Masia won again in a tightly contested Moto3 tilt with the lightweight title chase tighter than bark on a tree.
The MotoGP race itself was a portrait of disorder at the start. The clouds and humidity which featured all weekend finally gave way to rain five minutes before the start, with all riders on slicks. Well, not ALL riders, as Luca Marini and Alex Marquez were absent, nursing injuries received in the Buddh steam bath last week. Anyway, when the red lights went out, the grid departed their starting spots as if they were skating on black ice, and the wet race white flags came out on Lap 1. All the serious riders immediately entered the pits, leaving Fabio Quartararo, Michele Pirro, Stefan Bradl, Franco Morbidelli and Cal Crutchlow circulating on their way to complete irrelevance on slicks, gambling with nothing to lose that the rain might suddenly, unexpectedly quit. Check the standings at the end of Lap 1–you’ll never see those numbers at the top again.
Martin occupied P4 at the end of Lap 2. By Lap 6, in the driving rain, he had sliced through the top of the order into P1 where he stayed through the end of Lap 12, at which point the race was red-flagged. Although a restart was possible, the conditions failed to improve sufficiently to allow it, probably to the relief of the riders. And so Pecco Bagnaia’s lead in the 2023 title chase was cut from 13 points on Friday to three points on Sunday evening. Marco Bezzecchi trails Martin by 48 with Brad Binder, who crashed today and gutted my fantasy team, another 13 points back, but still in it by my reckoning, with the nasty, life-threatening part of the schedule starting in less than two weeks.
Still no announcement as to Marc Marquez’ plans for 2024, despite assurances that they would be revealed by this weekend. Ditto for Pedro Acosta, as there is now some doubt that he will get his ticket punched for MotoGP next season. A bunch of riders will be getting promoted from Moto3 to Moto2 next year, as per usual. We took issue with the provisional 2024 calendar elsewhere this weekend, even before we become fully immersed in the brutal piece of the 2023 schedule starting next time out in Indonesia, where afternoon temps are reliably in the 90’s and the humidity is like a wet towel. As one of our faithful readers commented concerning the riders and their attitudes toward the killer schedule, beatings will continue until morale improves.
Moto3 was a four-man cage match. Deniz Oncu, my boy Jaume Masia, and teenagers David Munoz and David Alonso spent the second half of the race in a small, select group going very fast in close quarters. During the last two laps it looked as if any of the four could win. At the flag, Masia trailed Alonso by 4/100ths of a second in the best race of the weekend.
Moto2 was another master class by The Next Great Spanish Rider as Pedro Acosta led from wire to wire, followed at the end by Celestino Vietti and Alonzo Lopez. A parade, despite the breathless efforts of Matt Birt and Louis Suddeby to make it interesting. The only remaining question is where Acosta will end up next season in MotoGP, or rather whose seat he will take. KTM may have to break a heart or two or a few contracts to hold onto this guy, who has Alien written all over him.
MotoGP was interesting for a while this weekend, at least until the end of Q2, when Jorge Martin, Marco Bezzecchi and Pecco Bagnaia assumed the positions they would occupy in both the Sprint and Sunday’s main event. Grizzled veteran Dani Pedrosa made the most of his second wild card round of the year with P4 finishes in both races. During the last third of Sunday’s race, it looked like he could snatch the final podium spot from Bagnaia, but the Italian, seriously wounded in last week’s race in Barcelona, dug deep enough to hold onto his 16 points. Martin now trails Bagnaia by 36 points in the 2023 title chase.
Once again, all-time track records fell like bowling pins this weekend, the last European round until the season finale in Valencia. In two weeks, it starts to get real, as the flying circus enters the autoclave, eight races in ten weekends, most of them in equatorial heat. In two weeks the combatants will be in India, with daytime high temps well into the 90’s, foreshadowing what most of the next two months will look like. Thus far, 2023 has been, relatively speaking, all fun and games. The provisional calendar for 2024 includes 22 rounds, with Kazakhstan added to the calendar and Aragon making a comeback.
MotoGP is approaching critical mass, a Darwinian survival-of-the-fittest ecosystem which will test the limits of machines, men and the laws of physics. Stay tuned.
The start of your typical Moto2 race.Dani Pedrosa returns in style.A little local color.A little more.Luca Marini and the Italian Air Force.Italian warplane loitering over the track.
We have been banging on for some time about how quickly a solid lead in the 2023 championship can/could change, based upon a cramped calendar and venues with the climate of blast furnaces. Today, we may have seen what I’ve been talking about. This is about the untimely injury Pecco Bagnaia received in Turn 2 of Lap 1 of the Catalan Grand Prix, when he high-sided out of the lead in front of a harried group of riders with full fuel tanks and gritted teeth.
There was simply no way for Brad Binder to avoid striking the prone Bagnaia, running his KTM across the Italian’s legs. Luckily, this was not the crash that killed Marco Simoncelli at Sepang in 2012, when a bike ran across his neck, nor the fatal injury suffered by Shoya Tomizawa in 2010 when his chest was crushed in a 250cc race in San Marino. At the time this article was posted, doctors were saying nothing more than Bagnaia’s legs suffered injuries necessitating a CT scan to determine the extent of the damage. During the race, pit reporter Simon Crafar casually referred to Bagnaia’s injury as a mere “tib fib,” along the lines of the injury suffered by Alex Rins at Mugello in early June and which has kept him out of action since. HRC is hoping Rins will be fit for next week’s Misano tilt, which would mark three months since he was hurt.
If Pecco has a “tib fib” or two, his season is effectively over. The 66-point lead he enjoyed prior to today’s race will not hold up over the next 13 weeks. Everyone who knows this sport knows all it takes is the blink of an eye…If he somehow avoided a catastrophic injury today, he is likely out for two or three rounds anyway, meaning it is a brand new day in the premier class.
Lost in the sauce of today’s frightening events was the historic Aprilia 1-2, with Aleix Espargaro and your boy Cole Trickle (OKA Maverick Vinales) taking the top two steps of the podium after the restart, joined by Jorge Martin. The announcers spent the entire day rattling on about tire wear, which is getting terribly old. How is it that none of the big manufacturers can design racing tires that will hold up for 25 laps? Wouldn’t the proceedings be more interesting if we could focus our attention on something other than tires? Exhibit A in this conversation is this photo of Vinales’ front tire about halfway through today’s race.
Anyway, today’s race was most exciting for me owing to the changes I made to my fantasy team roster prior to the weekend, substituting Espargaro and Vinales for Bezzecchi and Binder:
Midway through today’s Moto3 race, there was a 25 bike lead group separated by around three seconds. Just let that sink in for a moment. It was riveting until the very end, especially since two contenders, series leader Daniel Holgado and up-and-coming teenager David Munoz, got bumped out of the race on the last lap. Race results:
2023 standings after 11 rounds:
Moto2 was fun to watch, as Pedro Acosta, Heir Apparent, moved from ninth place on the grid to take the lead midway, only to have his tires melt down, forcing him to a P6 finish. Always fun to watch Aron Canet and his tattoos finish in second place.
Moto2 standings after 11 rounds:
Finally, in MotoGP
Premier class year-to-date:
Next weekend on the Adriatic coast at San Marino. Our best wishes go out to Pecco Bagnaia for a speedy, complete recovery. You gave us a big scare today, dude.
MotoGP announcer Matt Birt does, on the whole, a pretty impressive job calling races. He has an encyclopedic memory, working knowledge of the bikes themselves, an intimate familiarity with the various tracks, and mountains of facts and figgers at his disposal. He has literally forgotten more about the riders than you or I have ever known. The plummy British accent doesn’t hurt anything.
There are, however, two aspects of his announcing game that just grind me. The first is his reliable tendency (probably imposed by Dorna as a condition of his employment) to overhype every single aspect of the sport. As an example, given the fact that upwards of 99% of the people on the planet don’t give a rat’s ass about motorcycle racing, he uses the noun “glory” and its adjectival form way too much. He casually describes the outcome of, say, a Moto3 victory from 2016 as “his famous win…” On the other hand, I think MotoGP offers much more interesting racing than F1 and IndyCar, but he typically makes no effort to draw comparisons with 4-wheel racing, which is odd.
My second gripe has to do with Matt’s unceasing efforts at profundity. He doesn’t simply want to describe the action; he wants people standing around the virtual water cooler and commenting on online forums quoting his descriptions, which aspire to epic poetry. Occasionally he trips over his own metaphors. Which is what occurred (at least once) today when he got tangled up in mid-sentence, proclaiming in the post-Moto3 drivel that, “To the spoils go, (uh-oh) the victor.” It was clear he realized his gaffe in mid-sentence, but he was stuck. He couldn’t just say “ellipsis” and go on. He had stepped in it, had to scrape it off his shoe, and hope–probably with good reason–that no one other than a few journo-humps like me would notice.
As to the racing, most of the action in the premier class all weekend took place in the first ten seconds of the Saturday Sprint, when four or five riders got clattered in Turn 1. Readers will assess whether Jorge Martin or Maverick Vinales was to blame, but I think it was just the track layout itself, which funnels way too many big motorcycles with exaggerated wing things into a very tight space with everyone carrying full fuel and adrenaline loads. (One might argue that the beautiful track at Estoril, Portugal was taken off the calendar years ago due to an even more dicey first turn.) Bezzecchi, Oliveira and, eventually, Zarco would record DNFs as a result.
Some time later, the stewards decided to blame Martin for the event, after he had finished on the podium lol. This irked a number of riders whose day was ruined, although I’m not convinced it was exactly #89’s fault. He had to serve a long lap penalty on Sunday but still managed to score a handful of points on both days. Otherwise, it was all Pecco all the time on both days. One thing I can say without, as dad used to say, fear of successful contradiction is that Bagnaia will win most of the races out of which he doesn’t crash. His 62 point lead in the championship at the halfway point, while not insurmountable, is formidable. Martin and Bezzecchi look to be engaged in a cage match for the rest of the year and may become teammates at Pramac before all is said and done. Personally, I want to root for the skeletal Brad Binder and his KTM, as I am growing tired of the Ducati oligopoly.
Once again, the best race of the weekend was the Moto3 tilt. Heir apparent Pedro Acosta looked to be running away from the field in Moto2 until Celestino Vietti showed up late in the day to rain on his parade. Matt and Louis were anxious to proclaim that Vietti had, accordingly, been resurrected after a full year of whistling Dixie, but I’m not sold. Let’s see how he does during the Bataan Death March in September, October and November. Hell, let’s see how everyone does during the remarkably oppressive back nine. Dorna is probably going to discover, the hard way, that next year’s calendar needs more thought.
The photo finish from today’s Moto3 fight. The margin of victory was .005 seconds.
Late-Braking MotoGP 